IT & DATA MANAGEMENT RESEARCH,
INDUSTRY ANALYSIS & CONSULTING

Evolving
Requirements for
Digital Experience
Management (DEX)
July 2022 EMA eBook
By Steve Brasen
Prepared forTable ofContents

1Embracing Modern Management Theory

2

Digital Experience Inhibitors

3

Employee Experiences in a Multi-Device World

4

Supporting the Everywhere Workplace5

Impacts of Security on Employee Experiences

6

Identifying Solutions for SuccessEmbracing ModernManagement Theory
Over the past few years, businesses have reassessed embracing user-centric
approaches to IT. In particular, the “modern management theory” postulatesthat job satisfaction predicates workforce productivity, rather than financialcompensation. Applying this principle to the present day, use of IT requires
digital technology to serve the workers, rather than the other way around.
Today, the type and usability of the technology businesses offer to employees
are chief factors for attracting and retaining a talented workforce. According toresearch conducted by IT management solution provider Ivanti, 41% of businesses
they surveyed reported they had lost IT workers because they were unhappy
with having to perform excessive workloads. Rather than focusing on delivering“user-centric” technology that solely targets the goal of making workers
productive,1 modern management approaches address the broader goal ofenhancing employee experiences to elevate both productivity and job satisfaction.

1

Increasingly, businesses are defining
specific requirements for improving
employee experiences through digitaltransformation and modern management
toolsets. These objectives are either added
to existing service-level agreements(SLAs) or independently documented
in experience-level agreements (XLAs).
Emerging trends in IT management clearly
indicate that enterprises are focusing on
enhancing employee digital experiences
to address today’s most compelling
technology challenges.

Top IT Trends for the Everywhere Workplace, 2021

Evolving Requirements for Digital Experience Management (DEX).1

Digital Experience Inhibitors
The importance of managing employee
digital experiences is easily quantified byevaluating the sheer number of events that
impact workforce productivity. On average,
workers who regularly employ digitaltechnology to perform job tasks are affectedby an endpoint management challenge 919
times per year, which translates to about
3.67 issues per business day.2 Each of these
disruptions can have a cascading effect on
employee performance. Any time a user isdistracted from performing a job task, it
can take as much as 20 minutes for them torefocus back on their job function after theissue has been resolved.

The high frequency of employee experience
impacts also reduces the effectiveness of IT
administrators. On average, 40% of businessworkers contact enterprise help desk support
each week regarding a digital experienceissue, unnecessarily overburdening support
personnel and increasing the overall cost ofIT operations. Even worse, many workers
will forgo contacting help desk supportand instead ask an unqualified peer fora workaround that may actually furtherreduce their productivity. In that case,the root cause of the disruption is neverdiscovered, and incidents are doomed torepeat until someone informs an actual IT
administrator of the problem.

Performing authentication tasks (e.g., login and password)
Enabling secure remote access (e.g., initiating a VPN)
Problems accessing web/cloud apps and services
Initiating a service request (e.g., opening a help desk ticket)
Impacts related to security scanning processes
Systemic application hangs/crashes
Systemic endpoint device system crashes
Software requests
Impacts related to backup processes
Impacts related to patch deployments
Poor overall endpoint CPU performance (e.g., slow devices)
Poor application performance
Difficulty installing/configuring applications
Poor network performance
Poor endpoint memory utilization
284.69
76.92
67.61
56.63
55.08
55.04
48.33
44.08
43.98
43.15
40.04
35.64
34.33

103.74

Business employees suffer a wide variety
of productivity-impacting issues. However,
the most frequently experienced are related
to meeting security requirements, suchas access authentication, initiating VPN
connections, malware scans, and patch
deployments. Also frequently encounteredare difficulties accessing cloud-hosted SaaSand web services.

130.09Average number of times per
year each user suffers digital
experience issues, according
to surveyed businesses

Identifying Effective Digital Employee Experience (DEX) Management Solutions: A Quantitative Analysis, 2021

Evolving Requirements for Digital Experience Management (DEX).2

Employee Experiences in a Multi-Device WorldBusiness employees who are required to utilize digital technology as part of their job function
today employ, on average, 2.6 different devices, including desktop PCs, laptops, smartphones,and tablets.3 To be productive, they need to be able to access and use business IT resources in aconsistent manner across all of the devices they utilize—regardless of whether they use themfrequently or periodically. However, ensuring this seamless experience may prove challenging
given that unique form factors for each device (such as screen sizes, input devices, andoperating systems) require different user interactions.
The methods used to acquire and access different applications and IT service also vary greatly,
depending on the type of device. Some users may download resources via apps stores orbusiness app portals, while others can utilize SaaS, web, or virtual apps. Ultimately, the device
types and configurations must accommodate individual user preferences.

Percentage of survey respondents indicating the typesof devices they use to perform job tasks
79%

Laptop PC

74%

Desktop PC

49%

iPhone/iPad36%

Android phone/tabletChromebook

3The broad variety of endpoint device
configurations makes consistentand centralized management of user
experiences across all employee devices
difficult. Typically, this is because
administrators lack holistic visibility
across all devices, inhibiting their ability
to correlate device states and user activities.
To accurately assess user experiences,organizations should identify andremediate any problems, performancedegradations, and seek opportunities forimprovement consistently on all devices
in real time. Features supporting unified
endpoint management (UEM) that include
strong cross-platform support that iscentrally managed greatly enhance
DEX solutions.

22%

EMA Contextual Awareness Research Report, 2020

Evolving Requirements for Digital Experience Management (DEX).3

Supporting the Everywhere Workplace
Responding to workforce pressures andbusiness continuance requirements during
the COVID-19 pandemic, organizations
have substantially increased support forthe performance of work tasks outside of
the physical office. Today, 91% of businessworkers who utilize IT services perform
at least some of their job tasks at homeor at other remote locations.4 Only 9% ofbusiness employees have returned to theoffice full time, while another 9% are now
working from home full time. The majorityof workers (82%) are employing a hybrid
approach, performing tasks both in and outof the office. On average, 47% of businesstasks are now performed outside of thephysical office.

Having been introduced to the “Everywhere Workplace” benefits during the pandemic,
most workers are reluctant to ever return full time to a physical office. According to Ivanti’s
research,5 more than 87% of business employees prefer the flexibility of being able to performjob tasks outside of the physical office, while 71% noted they would prefer the ability to workfrom anywhere over receiving a promotion. Additionally, many respondents indicated they
have achieved significant personal benefits as a result of being able to work remotely, including:

43%

40%

48%

reported improvements totheir work/life balance

reported saving
money as a benefit

reported that the reduced
commuting time gave themmore time to perform workand personal tasks

Today’s workers require—and often demand—the same digital experiences operating
remotely as they encounter when they are physically in the office, such as easily accessing
systems and IT services. This requires the ability to operate fluidly over non-businessnetworks (including private and public Wi-Fi and internet services) without having to deal
with delayed or dropped connections. Network connections are particularly essential for
enabling remote communications, such as to support video conferencing.
When workers operate remotely, it can also be challenging for administrators to troubleshoot,remediate, and perform maintenance on their devices. Employees should be able to expect
the same level of support services regardless of their physical location. Similarly, businesses
must meet continuous requirements for security and compliance on company devices andany time they are communicating with business-hosted services.
45

Identifying Effective Digital Employee Experience (DEX) Management Solutions: A Quantitative Analysis, 2021
Everywhere Workplace Report, 2022

Evolving Requirements for Digital Experience Management (DEX).4

Impacts of Security on Employee Experiences
Ironically, one of the most overlooked
impacts to employee digital experiences isalso the most disruptive. Organizational
requirements for security are constant
distractions for users and performancedrains on endpoint devices. Typically,organizations view security and employee
experiences as diametrically opposed
forces—as you increase one, you decrease
the other. Based on this perspective, mostbusinesses choose to enforce security overenabling a productive workforce. However,
EMA research indicates that a reduction
in security friction results in significantly
fewer breach events.6
Security concerns are certainly warranted,
and breach events can significantly inhibit
workforce performance. For instance,

malware infections and ransomware
attacks can damage devices and prevent
access to critical resources. Browser cookies
and malicious software can also coopt
endpoint devices to perform unauthorizedtasks (such as cryptojacking), reducing
their performance. Once a device or
employee account is compromised, it canbe very disruptive and time-consuming toremediate, particularly if it requires a fullsystem recovery—not to mention damaging
to business reputations and finances.
Security breach events can also take anemotional toll on workers by adding stresses
that impact their productivity. It is therefore
important to recognize that preventing
security breaches is itself a method ofimproving employee experiences.

Successful phishing attack
User shared business data with unauthorized recipients

55.38%

13.46%

Ransomware infection

55.00%

23.08%

User shared credentials with unauthorized peer
User password or other credential posted on the dark web

17.31%
13.46%

To ensure security with minimal disruption
to employee experiences, policies andautomated processes must be adaptable towork around legitimate end-user business
requirements.

67.31%

25%

Unauthorized user accessed business applications

Unfortunately, many common security
management processes are also very
impactful to the performance of day-to-day
work tasks. High-friction authentication
processes (e.g., passwords, 2FA OTPs, etc.)
inhibit access to key business resources.
Network tunneling tools (such as VPNs) areoften cumbersome to use but are required
to gain secure access to business systems.
Additionally, security patch deployment
processes and malware scans degrade
endpoint performance and may force
system reboots.

26.92%
27.69%

41.15%

27.31%

Comparing the percentage
of surveyed organizations
experiencing security
breaches in the preceding
12 months between those withhigh-friction and low-frictionaccess security processes

Respondents using access security processes that REDUCE employee experiences
Respondents using access security processes that IMPROVE employee experiences
6EMA Contextual Awareness Research Report, 2020

Evolving Requirements for Digital Experience Management (DEX).5

Identifying Solutions for Success
The greatest challenge with introducing
an optimal DEX solution is addressing thebreadth of requirements across the four key
areas of support. Most DEX platforms on
the market today focus their management
strengths on just one or a few areas of
key functionality, such as monitoring,analysis, or automation. Gaps in offered
DEX solutions are typically addressed byrelying on points of integration with thirdparty products or the development ofcustom automation scripts. However, theDEX platforms that will most effectively
meet a business’s unique requirements arethose that will equally and natively support
key functionality across all four pillars ofsupport. A unified approach to DEX is easier
to deploy and maintain, while also more
rapidly achieving returns on investment.

coupled with flexible employee sentiment surveys, means Ivanti Neurons provides unified
visibility of both objective and subjective employee experience states. Collected information
is analyzed and calculated into a standardized user experience score, and the included“Smart Advisors” provide prebuilt charts on device and environment conditions while
offering actionable guidance on improvements and remediation actions.
Ivanti Neurons provides fully automated remediation functionality. Self-healing scripts,
called “bots,” run on demand or continuously in the background to perform tasks forcorrecting performance issues, making configuration changes, and implementing
environment improvements. While the platform includes an extensive library of prebuilt bots,it also provides an easy-to-use, low code/no code tool for creating custom bot workflows.
Ivanti’s DEX functionality is also fully extensible, enabling integrated support with other
Ivanti management technologies supporting unified endpoint management (UEM), patch
management, service management, and spend intelligence. A library of connectors is also
provided for integrating directly with third-party management solutions, such as ServiceNow,
and custom integrations may be created with the use of the provided REST API.

The evolving business requirements for
managing employee digital experiences
can only be achieved with a unified DEX
platform that provides core functionality
for monitoring devices, determining
employee sentiment, analyzing conditions,and automating effective responses.
As an example, the Ivanti Neurons
suite of management solutions offers acomprehensive and unified portfolio of
DEX functionality. Real-time visibility into
devices, users, applications, and IT services,
Evolving Requirements for Digital Experience Management (DEX).6

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